


Upstaged

by lettersbyelise



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Banter, Draco Malfoy in the Muggle World, Epistolary, First Dates, Fluff, Gay Draco Malfoy, Gay Harry Potter, Getting Together, Getting to Know Each Other, H/D Wireless 2019, Humor, Implied/Referenced Sex, M/M, Mentions of blow jobs, Obsessive Harry Potter, Snark, Theatre kid Draco
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-03
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-05-02 06:28:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19193569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lettersbyelise/pseuds/lettersbyelise
Summary: West End actor Drake O'Malley starts receiving fanmail from a (not so mysterious) stranger.





	Upstaged

**Author's Note:**

> For prompt #167 : 'Hi-Diddle-Dee-Dee (An Actors Life For Me)' - Pinocchio
> 
> Dear [coriesocks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coriesocks/pseuds/RuArcher), thank you for the awesome prompt! I hope you like what I did with it.
> 
> Thank you, ElleGray, for the _Pirates of Penzance_ inspiration.
> 
> Many, many, MANY thanks to my beautiful betas MaesterChill and Erin_Riwen. You rock <3

Dear ~~Draco~~  Drake O’Malley,

I’ll start with a little confession.

The thing is, I never go to the theatre. You see, I didn’t exactly grow up in a household of art lovers. My aunt and uncle probably filed performing arts under the ‘bloody useless waste of time and common sense’ category (perhaps with the exception of tired soap operas, in my aunt’s case), same as they felt for abstract paintings, installation art, and flash mobs.

Now that I’m an adult, I have no excuse not to do as I please, and perhaps going to the theatre would be one of those things I’d be into if only I had gotten into the habit at a younger age. As it is, it’s not something I ever think about. I never think about going to see a play as an option for a fun night out. I never even know what’s playing at the West End.

Until last night.

My friend Cecilia took me to the play. You don’t know her. She’s a ~~Muggle~~ few years older than us. She’s a barista in the coffee shop I go to whenever I run out of coffee, which is always because I never plan ahead. It’s close to ~~Grimmauld Place~~ my house. That’s how we met. Anyway, she’s a huge theatre nerd. She studied theatre at uni, and she’s a bit obsessed. So her birthday was coming up, and I asked her if I could take her to a play of her choice for the occasion, and she said yes, that she’d very much like to go and see _The Pirates of Penzance._ I bought tickets, met her in front of the Burger King on Leicester Square, and we had Whoppers and fried onion rings before going to the play.

I didn’t expect to encounter a familiar face, let alone find that familiar face on stage. At least, I _think_ you’re familiar? Nobody could be that… blond. With a face that pointy. And an accent that posh. And legs that skinny.

Playing the role of Frederic. The leading man, the hero, the heartthrob. Of course. _Typical._ And also… undeniably fitting.

It brought back a flood of memories.

What brought you to this life? This occupation? I might show up again, see the play another time. I was too distracted ~~by you~~ last night to pay proper attention.

Yours,

Harry Potter

 

 **Dear** ~~**Potter** ~~ **Harry Potter,**

**Your letter left me quite baffled. Was it supposed to be flattering? What a boorish way to thank an artist for his stellar performance: ‘blond, pointy, posh, skinny legs.’ Any other charming compliments you want to send my way? After telling me all about your appallingly pedestrian dinner of cheap fried food, no less. I feel vicariously bloated.**

**I am so very sorry your family wasn’t into arts, but just this once, you are right: it’s never too late to go against one’s disastrous upbringing.**

**And why would I even know your friend, when I don’t know who you are?**

~~**What kind of memories did it bring back?** ~~

**Please, do come back. We would be so very grateful to have your** ~~**stupid face** ~~ **patronage yet again.**

**Regards,**

**Drake O’Malley**

 

Dear _Drake_ (oh, for fuck’s sake),

I came back last night. Did you see me waiting with the back door crowd? I swear it’s you. It’s you, isn’t it? So this is where you disappeared to. Everybody’s been looking for you, did you know that? And here you were, hiding in plain sight.

I should have known. Slytherins will be Slytherins.

The play was brilliant, by the way. _You_ were brilliant. That voice of yours… ~~Merlin.~~ And ‘blond, pointy, skinny’ are not the only adjectives I could use to describe you. It’s just that ~~old habits die hard~~ they’re the first that came to mind.

Yours truly,

Harry Potter

 

**Dear Harry,**

**You are making less and less sense. Yours are the kind of letters that make me question the soundness of allowing fanmail. You clearly have me mistaken for someone else. Someone who is obviously not your favourite person, if the aforementioned adjectives are the most positive you can come up with to describe me.** ~~**Unless you can think of more flattering ones.** ~~

**Anyway. I am not the person you think I am, Potter. I have no idea who you’re talking about. And what on earth is a Slytherin?**

**Kindly leave me alone,**

**Drake O’Malley**

 

**Potter,**

**I saw you in the crowd last night. Again.** ~~**Those eyes of yours** ~~ **That revolting bird’s nest that you have the audacity to call a haircut is impossible to miss.**

**Did you not get my last letter? What happened to leaving me alone? How many more stamps must I spend on this supremely annoying correspondence until you get the message?**

**I’m not normally this vulgar, but needs must: sod off.**

**Drake O’Malley**

 

Dear Drake (fine, I’ll play by your rules, you stubborn git),

I apologise for waiting by the back door in the hopes of catching a glimpse of you. It wasn’t very polite, or straightforward, especially after you’d asked me to leave you alone. I won’t come again, unless you’re fine with it.

I also apologise for going with the criticism first - criticism on things you can’t change, like your face or your accent or those interminable legs of yours. I probably missed a few lines of dialogue at some point, staring at your legs.

I apologise for not telling you about everything I liked, that kept me returning to the theatre night after night. The play was all right, I suppose (this is coming from someone who doesn’t know the first thing about plays and theatre, mind you) but you, Drake… you were fantastic. Your presence lit up the stage. I mean, obviously it did, with a face like yours and hair like yours and that voice… so deep and steady, so convincing, it made me forget I was watching a live play at times. It pulled me right into the action, your character’s motives and emotions. You’re a glorious actor, and singer, and I’d forgotten how beautiful you are and I wish Cecilia would have dragged me to the West End sooner, if it meant seeing you in more of your previous plays.

I hope you take this as the compliment and the peace offering it is.

Yours,

Harry Potter

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Apology accepted. Tosser.**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

I probably deserved it. ~~You giant wanker.~~

Anyway! Should we ignore our previous letters then? Start from the top?

You never told me what made you choose this career. It’s quite… original. For you of all people.

You don’t have to answer, of course. I won’t tell anyone. I’m just interested in you.

Thanks,

Yours,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**A good friend of mine once told me I was a very good actor. It was back when we were kids, in school. I think she meant that ironically. You see, I’ve always been… this side of theatrical. I can admit it now. I’m a grown-up. I like to be the centre of attention, it’s true.** ~~**Pansy** ~~ **My friend sometimes used the word histrionic (because she’s a cow) (also, I suppose she just liked to show off all the big words she knew) (with all her faults, I still love her to bits, so. Don’t take any of this the wrong way. My friends are fantastic, Potter.)**

 **At the time, I was doing my best to hide my feelings for a certain someone. My strategy (can we call it a strategy when ‘defence mechanism’ is probably more accurate?) was to pull that person’s pigtails, metaphorically speaking.** ~~**You didn’t have pigtails, thank Merlin.** ~~ **And it worked. The object of my affection never had a clue. Retrospectively… I wish I had been more honest about my intentions. But back then… I just couldn’t. My father wouldn’t have taken the news very well. Neither would his ‘friends,’ shall we say.**

 **The idea stayed with me, though. Acting. There were no acting lessons at school, no end-of-year plays, no art classes of any kind. I can see now how closed-minded the education I received was. At home of course, but also at school, all things considered. Beside learning to master and improve the innate ‘talent’ we were all born with, we were not offered many opportunities to broaden our horizons (even the one class I can think of… It was just that: one bloody class, and an elective one, moreover). I applied to drama school (and gave my friend** **Pansy** **a good chuckle when she heard) and found that I loved it as much as I had expected. Funny how fast we can get better at something we truly enjoy, isn't it? Just a few years of training, and I started getting noticed by theatres before I even graduated. Fast forward to today, and here I am, writing to you about it**

 **What about you? Not that I'm curious?** ~~**But I am curious** ~~ **I'm just being polite.**

**Regards,**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

What have I been up to since the last time I saw you? Frankly, nothing as exciting as your life.

Went into law enforcement right after school (like my best friend. Like the people I'd admired when I was a teenager. Like what I thought was the right thing to do)

Dropped out of law enforcement a year later (So many reasons. I didn’t like it as much as I expected. I wasn’t as good at it as I expected. It wasn't doing anything for my mental health. Even _I_ was able to recognise that)

Split up with my girlfriend from school (are we going to pretend you don’t know who we’re talking about? I just— _nevermind_ )

Now I’m taking a break from it all. My friends worry I’m going to turn into some sort of rich layabout if I don’t choose another career path soon. And not even a fun, eccentric one, to make their assumptions even more tragic. They really needn’t worry, though. I have a few ideas already. But, as I said… I need a break. I need to do nothing for a while. Be with my thoughts. Go for coffee in the mornings, have a nice chat with Cecilia, then go for a long walk (London is so bloody lovely in the spring.) Come home, cook, read a book.

(I know, Harry Potter, reading a book. Well, piss off, ~~Malfoy.~~ Make fun of me all you want. I’m a changed man.)

That’s it. You know everything. Nothing exciting, I told you.

Cheers,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Sorry about your split-up.**

**(Was it because of Cecilia?)**

**Regards,**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

No. It was because I’m actually gay.

Harry

 

Dear Drake,

Uh. It’s been a couple of days, and you haven’t replied to my last letter. Are you all right?

Harry

 

Dear Drake,

Oh god, I know what happened.

Harry

 

Dear Drake,

I broke you. Didn’t I?

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**You… didn’t break me.**

**I just… didn’t know that about you.**

**Thank you. For telling me. I know it’s often not an easy revelation to make.**

**Warm regards,**

**DM**

**PS: For the record: I am gay, too.**

 

Dear Drake,

Yeah, you know, I kinda sussed that out by myself :)

Yours,

Harry

PS: I see you’ve moved to ‘warm regards’. Brilliant. That’s progress ;)

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Care to elaborate?**

**Regards** **(piss off),**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

Well. Just speaking from experience, here. I hate to generalise, but I haven’t met many straight men who spend the amount of time and care you obviously put into your grooming (I am not complaining, mind you) ~~(you look bloody dashing) (you look like the fucking sun) .~~

Also, I seem to remember you spent an awful lot of time in very tight leggings on stage. I have a suspicion the costume designers who came up with Frederic’s outfit knew exactly what they were doing, because it’s quite unfair. You… you look like you were born to wear those things. The way they highlight your body, the way you move in them, so seamlessly, like water on a window pane.

See? They drive me to distraction. They put me in a poetic mood.

All the leggings’ fault.

Yours,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Oh, the leggings’ fault, is it?**

**If you’re done stereotyping people’s sexualities, perhaps you can tell me what your point is?**

**DM**

 

Dear Draco Drake,

I didn’t mean to upset or insult you. It was just. I was just trying to tell you: I know, and I’m all right with that.

I feel like an arse.

Sorry.

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**I was teasing you. I know what you were trying to tell me (and thank you, by the way, for all the compliments, veiled or not. I was blushing so hard reading your letter, Pansy noticed and asked who my mysterious suitor was) (I told her to go suck a Doxie egg. I don’t have suitors)** ~~**(I have lovers)** ~~ **. I don’t mind that I look gay. It’s sort of the point, isn’t it? I chose this life to be who I am. Because I wouldn’t have been allowed to be who I am, had I accepted my preordained life. I won’t cover it up, when it’s at the foundation of every decision I’ve ever made for myself as soon as I was able.**

**I hope I’m forgiven, at least for this. And I shall ask you again: did your stream of gushing, clumsy legging poetry have a point?**

**Warm regards (you are back on the list),**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

It was just a very convoluted way to ask you on a date. And Merlin knows I’m not a convoluted person (so maybe that’s why it didn’t work?)

Anyway: dinner? Maybe? Soon?

Yours,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Are you asking me on a date because I’m the only gay man you know?**

**Warm regards,**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

One: why must you be a pain in the arse, always?

Two: I happen to know several other gay men. And people all over the LGBT spectrum.

Three: I’m still waiting for your answer to my question. It’s not very polite to leave a bloke hanging.

Yours,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**One: have we met?**

**Two: oh, I am so very relieved to know I shall not be your one token gay friend.**

**Three: yes.**

**DM**

 

Dear Drake,

Yes?

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Yes, you giant, clueless, infuriating prat.**

**Yes.**

**DM**

 

Dear Draco (yes, sorry, I just. I can’t keep with the charade. I’ve seen you, for Merlin’s sake. In the flesh. Across a table from me at Bel Canto, eating your dinner with manners worthy of a young prince. Your cheeks going pink with the wine and the warmth of the restaurant and the warmth of our conversation. Under the drizzle when we walked outside, your hair sticking to your forehead. Sprawled on my bed, naked, hungry, eager),

Can I see you again soon?

Yours,

Harry

 

Draco,

Did you get my last letter? (It’s a rhetorical question. I know you did. I sent it by owl to be sure you got it.)

Yours,

Harry

 

Draco,

I don’t know what’s going on. I keep going through every detail of that night, trying to figure out where it went wrong. What I did wrong. Did I do anything wrong?

(You didn’t act like I did. You seemed to enjoy yourself. ~~Understatement.~~ I know I did.)

Yours,

Harry

 

Draco,

I came to see _The Pirates of Penzance_ again. Cecilia thinks I’m a bit obsessed (Well, I might be. Just not for the reasons she thinks).

That’s all. I’m at a loss what to say. If you don’t want to see me again… I could understand.

~~Just tell me why.~~

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**I apologise for my delayed reply. It was not very civil of me.**

**Oh, fuck it. I’ll say it. I’m sorry. I’ve been an arse.**

~~**We’re each taking turns, it looks like.** ~~

**I came home after** **our** **that night and I was paralysed. I’ll admit it was all because I was profoundly embarrassed by my behaviour and how much I revealed to you.**

**When I agreed to have dinner with you, I was ready for you to know, without a doubt, who I really was. (You had guessed correctly. Blond, posh, pointy, blah blah blah. It wasn’t that hard. Shut up.)**

**I knew. I had braced myself for painstaking, blunderous chit-chat. We never used to be particularly good at talking, you and I. So it was a fair assumption, wasn’t it?**

**Instead… Instead I found myself caught up in easy, flowing conversation. Caught up in the fond, unwavering focus of your eyes. (Ugh. I can just hear myself, sounding like a swooning Victorian heroine.) Opening up, telling you things I’d never thought I’d tell** **_Harry bloody Potter._ ** **And you… you were so candid with me. I thought you’d be this closed-up person, mangled up and never put back whole again after the war. You see, Potter, I realise I’d underestimated you once again, if I assumed anyone, Voldemort included, could ever quell your indomitable spirit.**

 **So when you looked at me outside the restaurant, underneath the falling rain and that street light that lit up your eyes like emeralds under water… I couldn’t say no. Not that you asked me anything (never thought you’d be the gentleman out of the two of us). I couldn’t say no to** **_myself_ ** **. My own curiosity, my own desire to press my lips to the side of your jaw. To slide my hands down your sides, feel each one of your ribs, feel the pulse of your stubborn, brave, beating heart against my palms. To undress you, to kiss every one of your scars. To feel you touch me, take my body apart with yours, and then let me return the favour.**

**I’d wanted that for so long, it wasn’t even a fantasy. The yearning, the burn — it was something that had become a part of me.**

**This is why I apologise, Harry. I should have been more careful. I should have summoned my teenage, cowardly self. You saw it all, and now that there isn’t anything left for you to see, will you still want me?**

**(Desperately, stupidly) yours,**

**DM**

 

Dear Draco,

You must be joking.

You’ve only shown me the tip of the iceberg. I want to know all of you. I want to listen to you tell me more about your life, and your future. I want to feel every inch of your skin under my fingertips. I want to listen to the sounds you make when I take you in my mouth. I want to feel the weight of you on me. Until you’re sick of me. Will I ever be sick of you? There’s no way we can predict it. But all evidence seems to prove the opposite. I’ve never really been sick of you since I was eleven. Always seeking you out, teasing you, chasing you, following you around like a lovesick fool (let’s face it, you weren’t much better).

I can’t get you out of my head, Draco Malfoy. I never could.

Let’s see each other again. Preferably as soon as humanly possible. Please?

Yours,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**How about next Friday?**

**Yours,**

**DM**

 

**Dear Harry,**

**Last night was... Well. Isn’t it a pity? You left me quite speechless, I can’t even tell you** **~~my body is wrecked, sated, shivering. My mind is full to bursting~~.**

**Yours (so much),**

**DM**

 

Dear Draco,

It is a pity. It was quite a glorious night. So instead, I’ll give you my own version of it:

Holy fucking Merlin, Malfoy, it felt like I could never have enough of you. That feeling of wanting someone even as you’re having them. That feeling of _more_ even as you’re floating in a sea of satiation. Listen to me. I didn’t know those feelings even existed. Thanks for introducing them to me. I feel ruined, but it’s all for a good cause.

Next time I see you, the first thing I’ll do is kneel between your spread legs and suck your cock until you can’t help it, until you stop being careful, until you pull my hair and groan my name and come on my face. And then... Well, I’m not going to reveal all the plot. I’ve learnt as much from the play you’re in. Cliffhangers have their uses. Like enticing you to agree to another date.

How does that sound?

(fucking always, apparently) yours,

Harry

 

**Dear Harry,**

**I… I’m free tonight after the show.**

**Yours (yours, yours)**

**DM**

 

Dear Draco,

You know where I’ll be. Front row again, rooting for my heart stoppingly gorgeous Frederic ~~I just really like you in those shiny tights~~.

Then I’ll be waiting for you out in the back with your adoring crowd.

I don’t care. I’ll out-fan them all.

And it will just be the beginning.

Yours,

Harry

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments are the best <3 I'd love to hear your thoughts! (fic claim post [here](https://lettersbyelise.tumblr.com/post/186816176446/fic-claim-upstaged) :D)
> 
>  
> 
> Come say hi on [tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/lettersbyelise)!


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